able distance which was supposed to separate the bishop from the
curate in Cradock's 'Reminiscences.' Bishop Warburton was to preach in
St. Lawrence's Church in behalf of the London Hospital. 'I was,' writes
Cradock, 'introduced into the vestry by a friend, where the Lord Mayor
and others were waiting for the Duke of York, who was their president;
and in the meantime the bishop did everything in his power to entertain
and alleviate their patience. He was beyond measure condescending and
courteous, and even graciously handed some biscuits and wine in a salver
to the curate who was to read prayers!'[662]

So far as one can judge, this wide gulf which divided the higher from
the lower clergy was by no means always a fair measure of their
respective merits. The readers of 'Joseph Andrews' will remember that
Parson Adams is represented not only as a pious and estimable clergyman,
but also as a scholar and a divine. And there were not wanting in real
life unbeneficed clergymen who, in point of abilities and erudition,
might have held their own with the learned prelates of the period.
Thomas Stackhouse, the curate of Finchley, is a remarkable case in
point. His 'Compleat Body of Divinity,' and, still more, his 'History of
the Bible,' published in 1733, are worthy to stand on the same shelf
with the best writings of the bishops in an age when the Bench was
extraordinarily fertile in learning and intellectual activity. John
Newton wrote most of his works in a country curacy. Romaine, whose
learning and abilities none can doubt, was fifty years old before he was
beneficed. Seed, a preacher and writer of note, was a curate for the
greater part of his life. It must be added, however, that as the
eighteenth century advanced, a very decided improvement took place in
the circumstances of the bulk of the clergy--an improvement which would
have been still more extensive but for the prevalence of pluralities.

Unhappily, among the evils resulting from the multiplication of a needy
clergy, which may be in part attributed to the undue accumulation of
Church property in a few hands, mere penury was not the worst. Some
clergy struggled manfully and honestly against its pressure, but others
fell into disreputable courses. These latter are not, of course, to be
regarded as representative men of any class in the Church. They were
simply the Pariahs of ecclesiastical society; the black sheep which will
be found, in one form or another, in every